Catfish Cantos IV: The Wheel

Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,
was getting old.
Her cards all used and her hands
like stubs of
burnt olive trees.

Here, said she, is the Drowned Calf.
I don’t know if it’s your card. This
is the Wheel, and this is the card
of our sponsor. Thank you!

Come on, there’s nothing to it!
Now jump from the pier, will you!
The water is good,
and something’s tickling
my feet.

Ladies and gentlemen,
The World’s Got Talent Incorporated
proudly presents
a new star. She sings like a bird,
and further we heard …
“Yeah, that’s right!“
… you can, is that right,
foretell the future?
A big hand for Insomnia Perkins!

Far from the surface,
down in the deep,
little catfish thrives. Lush
are the banks
of the river. They feed
on everything. They don’t think,
they feed. Some will
survive.

First of all I wanna thank everybody.
It’s so great to be here with you tonight in HD.
I see crowds of people
dancing round in a ring. So many!
Now I turn the wheel of fortune,
and away we go!

It’s a win-win situation. I know
what you think: fracking, climate change,
money crisis, corporations, international conflicts,
I know.
But what I say is this: If we talk together
to reach a consensus, we can really make it.
I don’t like this negativity that I sometimes sense.

No, Mr. Hirosaki, we never speak the names
of the two cities. Yes, thank you for the bonsai,
quite futile, still … well.

Isn’t it great that we’re all together now!
Email me, I wanna show you
this YouTube video about
a leopard caring for a baby baboon
after having
devoured its mother.
Oh, you saw it? Cute, ain’t it?

No, I’m fine. I mean,
you gotta believe in something, no?
My wheel is happy.
Sometimes,
when I cannot sleep at night,
I watch the moon and the stars above.
I’m more on the celestial side,
my mother says.

Daughter daughter, shun deep water,
don’t get nearer to the mirror!
Fish will come and snatch your toes;
this is how the story goes.